Meet Kame Robotto, the world's first turtle robot (video)

We’ve covered a number of weird robots on CrunchGear in the past, but this one’s a first. Meet Kame Robotto, which is probably the world’s first turtle robot (kame means robot in Japanese). Made by Tokyo-based robot venture Kondo [JP], the robot is actually sold as the first of a series of “animal robots” that Kondo plans to roll out in the next few months.

Hardware-wise, the turtle robot is pretty basic. It’s powered by a 10.8V-300mAh Ni-MH “Robo Power Cell” and has just has nine joints (two in each of its four legs and one in the head). There are not too many extras (for example a camera or sensors) to be found, either, and buyers will need to get things such as a remote control separately, too.

But at least the price is reasonable: the turtle robot kit will cost $450 when it goes on sale in Japan on Thursday. Robot geeks living outside Japan will have to contact their import shops, as Kondo has no plans of bringing this or any other animal robots to markets outside this country at this point.